


Ribbons

by StarlitShadowHuntress



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Set during season two, this has been in my drafts for literal years but I decided to finally post it, when your sister fakes her death but doesn't tell you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-12
Updated: 2019-10-12
Packaged: 2020-12-14 00:31:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21006719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlitShadowHuntress/pseuds/StarlitShadowHuntress
Summary: There’s always risks involved in faking your own death to get ahead in the game.Jade Crock didn’t die, not entirely, which meant that Jade Nguyen, couldn’t replace her. That Cheshire couldn’t usurp her.Not all villains are stone-cold.





	Ribbons

**Author's Note:**

> Set after YJS2 "Darkest"

The assassin had taken a week off from the usual line of work. She attended the funeral, sitting in the back row with Roy, avoiding eye contact with the heroes who had attended. They knew why she was here. She blamed them for Artemis’ death. She didn’t care much for the formalities of funerals, for the kids who had once been in her class and wanted to share an anecdote, for the long winded, sad speech that Mini-Flash had drafted about never loving again.

Artemis, her sister, who had never once fallen to The Light’s clutches, was dead. Killed by someone she used to trust. The little merboy who didn’t deserve to see daylight again. The fishstick who had the gall to not only kill her, but completely disrespect her remains.

According to the league, What was left of Artemis had been so disfigured that it couldn’t be shown to her one last time, even lying stiff, engulfed in the stench of formaldehyde.

Life just wasn’t fair, sometimes. But Cheshire should know a thing or two about fair, by now.

Jade had fallen into the shadows while treading the thin tightrope between history and a future. She couldn’t forget how gracefully Artemis had danced over that very thread on hope alone, choosing to blaze her own trail, never fazed by the opinions of anyone else. She was too young, too good to go.

Jade’s head tipped farther down, jaw stiff. She felt Roy’s arm, ghosting her shoulder. She shrugged it away.

_ It should have been you. _ a voice taunted, somewhere in the back of her mind.  _ You who stood watch with Batsy’s little bird that night. You, who got killed. Artemis didn’t deserve that death, and you know it. _

Roy tried to offer his hand to her. She nudged it off of her lap.

Once everyone had left the funeral, Jade knelt on the ground in front of the newly placed tombstone. Roy left her there, with Lian, and a promise to get her later, so they could have supper together. She had spent an hour crying, apologizing, and promising payback on Artemis’ honour. All she could do now was mourn, and as her ‘father’ had spat out at her, “get over it, princess”.

Jade grieved, but Cheshire was already over it. Cheshire had vowed revenge on the Atlantean who stole her sister’s life, She had staked her claim, and the League of Shadows had begrudgingly agreed. The boy who still dared to call himself Aqualad was hers to dispose of.

She returned after supper to the one-bedroom flat she and Lian called “home”. It was more like a safehouse than anything else, but it was equipped with all that she needed. And a few extra things she couldn’t part with. She didn’t stay with Roy. She didn’t want to, at least not for tonight. Tonight, she would do what she did best. Drink, destroy, dispose, and get even.

She started with the kitchen. She scrubbed at the stove with a towel until she could see her own reflection, then moved on to taking out the garbage.

She was moving the couch to sweep under if when she saw the shoebox. It was dull, cardboard, and smaller than the rest of the boxes in the apartment.

She knew what was in that shoebox the second she held it in both hands. She shook it, getting light rustling in return.

_ It’s going to hurt the longer you leave it. Might as well bite the bullet now. _

Flinging the lid away, she sat down, the box dropping next to her with a gentle thump, colourful ribbons spilling out onto the floor as her head hung low.

A parting gift from a sister to an orphaner.

* * *

“Please, sis? Help me out?” The request from the girl fell on empty ears as Jade Crock packed up her bags, preparing to leave for good.

“I can’t. I’m running away. It would do you better to learn how to survive on the streets instead of learning how to make your hair look pretty, Artemis.” The taller girl spat, and dug under the mattress to find her most recent art project. A mask with a catlike face painted on it. She tried it on for size, adjusting the straps and making sure it wouldn’t fall off.

“The prettier you are, the quicker you end up on a missing persons list. And we both know what will happen to you if you can’t free yourself before they take you to a secondary location.”

Jade would die tonight and get reported as missing. Cheshire would rise from the rubble.

Jade had been a puppet. A weak willed girl who took all the abuse her father threw at her. Cheshire would have no time for weakness. Cheshire would be ruthless, emotionless, and powerful. Her sympathies would lie with whoever paid her better. She would disappear from crime scenes, just like the Cheshire Cat. She would even keep her mother’s last name.

Jade Nguyen.

It’s pronounced “win” for a reason.

“But Jade-”

“Jade is gone now. She’s dead. You understand? Cheshire is, and will be, all that’s left.” She snapped. She removed her mask, folded up the last of her clothes, and packed them soundly in her gym bag. If any security cameras caught her heading out, it’d support the idea that she’d been caught with the wrong crowd while heading to the gym. This was Gotham, after all. No citizen in their right mind would question the tragic fate the media would paint of the young teen. They would roll their eyes at her news story taking up so much airtime. Nobody would care enough to search for her body. She pushed open the window to the fire escape.

“You can’t just run away!” Artemis had protested, holding tighter to her stuffed bear. “Dad will come after you-” 

She fixed her little sister with a long, determined glare. Her father had done enough. He would never control her life again. Jade would disappear, and she would be free.

“Let him try. I’ll disappear into the night like the Cheshire Cat.”

“Jade, don’t you get it? We have to keep this family from falling apart-”

She fought back a laugh. Family was the only thing holding her back. “Haven’t you learned anything? In this family, it’s every girl for herself.”

The first ribbon she had found at the bottom of her sports bag that same night. For some odd reason, the teen had been inclined to keep it. More had come later. Sometimes tied to her sister’s arrows, sometimes wrapped around streetlights. Some were even dropped into her lap while she sat waiting in her cell.

They always carried messages.

Blue ribbons meant that Artemis missed her. Grey meant she wasn’t missing out on anything special in her little sister’s life. Red meant the opposite, that Jade had missed out on something important. Black meant the shadows were planning something, that she would get broken out soon, only to play her part and get tossed back in the slammer, a scapegoat for the rich and powerful, a pawn for their games.

Sometimes, Cheshire would rip her uniform, and get rid of the fabric scraps by tying it to an arrow, a batarang, whatever was left at the scene. Sure, green and black weren't the best colours to communicate that things were going well on her end, but as long as she made it out alive, Artemis could extrapolate all she wanted.

It was Jade’s way of communicating to her sister.

There’s always risks involved in faking your own death to get ahead in the game.

Jade Crock didn’t die, not entirely, which meant that Jade Nguyen, couldn’t replace her. That Cheshire couldn’t usurp her.

Not all villains are stone-cold.

* * *

Artemis, her sister, had learned how to braid her hair by herself. She didn’t like to, that much was clear. Most days Artemis just brushed it out of her face and kept it swept up in a ponytail, with an elastic. The only time Artemis had tied ribbons in her hair was for prom, then graduation from college, then the night she had attended her and Roy's "commitment ceremony". Most days Artemis didn’t allow others to touch her hair. It was off limits except to family, and Jade, to her surprise, still counted as family.

The other ribbons had come once Artemis had started watching over Lian. She’d come back from her visits with Aunty Artemis, hair full of ribbons. Artemis would roll her eyes when they were found neatly tied around her mailbox the next morning, but she kept at it until eventually, the ribbons stopped coming back, and Jade learned, and Lian wore them in her hair more often.

And now Artemis was dead.

Jade had to throw up.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope it was a good read!


End file.
